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Being an ordained Buddhist, I reflect at least once daily on my vows… the promises that I made not just myself, but you and the rest of my life. The reason why I say You and the rest of my life is because the intention of precepts are to improve the harmony and balance that we have with each other. I regard them as a compass to navigate my relationships.

For a long time, I've had to interact and deal with a person who can be very abusive and erratic. They yell, scream, attack, are hyper-critical, make nonsensical arguments, rarely listen, distort facts, use magnification - making mountains out of mole hills and are just plain old negative.

I have the awareness that no matter what I do, forwards, backwards, moving side-to-side or standing still they ultimately will be no satisfaction. In truth, they've got to be pretty mentally and emotionally sad. They're not just inappropriate with me, it's pretty much everybody. By reputation this person is strongly feared. Over the past 5-6 weeks, I'm just their latest (primary) target. In the end, their anger doesn't really say anything about me, but is more of an editorial statement about them. The question people most frequently ask me is, "How do you put up with _________? I don't know how you are doing it." My answer is pretty simple. I deal with it the best I can, in the given moment.

In attempting to do my best to deal with this person, I frequently hear myself saying the words, "You have to go on without me." That's my personal way of saying that I make the active choice not to act out, yell, scream and attack back, but to stand assertively. I just keep repeating the provable facts of a given situation, so that I don't get distracted or pulled into the emotional storm and their vitriol. Other times, I visualize rocks or a cliff face that live at the edge of the ocean and see them being battered by waves. i notice the resolute, determined nature of the rocks or cliff to remain true to their inherent nature. No complaining, just being. Other times I remind myself that though they are acting in a rough way, somewhere beneath all that, there must be an awakened mind that's just sleeping in the present moment.

In those tough moments, I make the effort to put my mind in those places that I just mentioned. I don't always make it and end up absorbing some of the negative energy and get sad, frustrated or bummed out. I have a word for when I'm in that state. I call it an "AFGO," which means, "Another frickin' growth opportunity." Saying that reminds me not to take on other peoples clouds and darkness and find a way to move out of the negative current.

Usually the easiest and fastest way out of the negative emotional current is by finding someone to hang out with that has a caring mind or go out and help someone. Getting out of my head can quickly put things in perspective and the feeling of being dragged down lifts and I can psychologically, emotionally and spiritually breath better. And it's all based around the policy of human kindness. This is the fundamental theme of not just the Ten Buddhist Precepts, but all of Zen too. Human and humane kindness is our home and our true nature. All the other stuff is just that… stuffed and fake. I choose to live my life by vow.

May We Practice Our Life Well,

Jaye Seiho Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

My thoughts this morning are on the feeling that we are always, one hundred precent of the time, at the center of our life. Despite being at the center, the challenge is always, come too, in the present moment.

May We Practice Our Life Well,

Jaye Seiho Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Yesterday I went out body boarding. Since I was a kid, minus one incident where I almost drown, I've almost always felt safe and calm, when I'm in the water. The conditions were pretty good, with head high waves, plus 1 to 3 feet on top of that and a breeze that cause the waves to be very clean… initially. As the day wore on and the tide change, naturally and like clock work the rip currents emerged. As they did, the lifeguards gathered people around their towers, instructing people of the potential danger and what to do, if they got caught in the rip current.

Despite the best effort of the lifeguards to explain and caution people, they went in many times to rescue people who got caught unaware of their circumstance.  They began to get pulled out to sea, by the ever changing currents, outside their conscious awareness and focus. With out the lifeguards watching, helping and rescuing, they would quite literally be dead, getting lost in the rip. In fact, there are reports today at the beach that one people appears to be lost, to yesterdays rip current.

Yesterday as I sat on my board, took waves and played in the water, getting caught in rip currents and moving out of them, i never felt in danger. But the truth is that I always was. Something could have gotten far out of my manageable circumstances, with negative results potentially ensuing.

As I sat on the cushion this morning, attentive to my posture, breathing and listening, what emerged is that rip currents don't just happen in the water. Rip currents happen in our life, all the time, every single day of our life. Depending on our response sometimes we get temporarily swept out to the deep waters of our  psychological and emotional sea, wondering if there is a lifeguard to save us or how we can possibly get out of the rip currents on our own. How do we swim through our everyday life rip currents, so that we do get lost or drown by the distractions or circumstances of our life?

The honest answer is that there is no one thing that moves us out of the rip currents. My first choice is always Zen… the practice of unification or put another way, some practice that is spiritual in nature that allows us to work and live with ourselves in a way that is helpful and self-befriending. Sometimes its with the support of a friend, pointing out that we are in a mess, when perhaps we don't realize that we are. Have supports in our life that promote, self-awareness, self-esteem and a way that we can life forward like self-help programs, books and even podcasts that are positive in nature.  And the last thing I will mention is a mind that is more focused on the solution than the problem. When we focus only on the problem, blocking out solutions is when we begin to panic and get lost in our psychological and emotional rip currents.

As we practice our life today, we can look, check and examine if we are caught in any rip currents that are dragging us off course or out and away from where we are hoping to be. If there is, we can then start looking for a way to swim or live parallel to it, until a spot opens where we can somehow move out of it. I would only remind us both that this is a process and not an event. It can take a little time and effort. It's not helpful for us to give up on ourselves. We can remember fortitude. The spiritual strength for the endurance of hardships. We can have the confidence that we can meet our challenges and difficulties well, with the support of others. And finally… If someone does get into the waters of your life, coming to help and perhaps bring you out of the rip… please don't fight that person… surrender and accept the help… sometimes our friends are true lifeguards.

May We Practice Our lIfe Well,

Jaye Seiho Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

There's a line from the movie Magnolia that has stuck with me, ever since I head it. "You may be done with the past, but the past may not be done with you." Reflexively the word karma comes to mind. The other thing that comes to mind is knowing that life has a way of catching up to us, no matter how much we may try to dodge it. Whatever actions we take, positive or negative, there will always be a result and we have to live with and though them.

Yesterday this was brought front and center though a medical problem of someone close to me.  Over a long period of time, I had been pointing out, "Hey this is something that is a problem that needs to be taken care of. The result of avoiding the situation will bring an outcome you're not going to like and that could be life threatening." 

I knew this, based on personal experience and was in a way attempting to short circuit possible future suffering, for this person. The effort of awakening heart-mind is always to seek opportunities to reduce suffering. I was attempting to do this from the direction of "A smart person learns by their own mistakes, but a wise person learns from the mistakes of others." I went at it soft, medium and hard. No matter how I worked with the individual and another person closely connected, there was always some sort of avoidance and resistance. The bottom line is the effort to accept help and find a way forward was set aside and ignored.

Eventually, I just kinda gave up on the issue, pulling back altogether, seeing that I was exhausting myself on the effort and that on the other side of the table there was about zero effort. I'd been telling myself that perhaps I was mistaken and maybe this particular result won't come. Unfortunately precisely what I was concerned about came to pass and boom there it was. It was a tearful and incredibly painful moment. The results of avoidance forced a very difficult outcome.

The lesson comes, before the understanding. For me, I've decided not to make guesses or assumptions about what these particular people close to me has learned. I don't really know if they get it, in depth or magnitude. I'm 100% powerless over that. For me the lesson has been, "If you are in the middle of a fire, see and know that you are it, so that you recognize you need to get out." If I avoid that reality, I'm going to be destroyed more by my avoidance than the actual flames.

As the doctor said, I wish I could make everything nice and fluffy, but I can't. If we live in avoidance mode and putting things off, our outcomes and results will usually be pretty chaotic and unmanageable. Rather than avoid, I find it better to turn and face. I would prefer not to run and hide from the realities that compose my life. This is the foundation of Zen.

May We Practice Our Life Well,

Jaye Seiho Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO